Monday, February 13, 2017

The Good Life
Psalm 34

"What man is there who desires life and loves many days,
that he may see good? Turn away from evil and do good..."—Psalm 34:12,14

The good life is the good life. Put another way, happiness is doing the right thing, a tenet the wise have always known.

The world is constantly telling us, in one way or another, that happiness is doing things our way, but that's a gigantic lie. It only leads to emptiness, anxiety and heartache. (W.H. Auden writes of children "lost in a haunted wood, / Children afraid of the night / Who have never been happy or good.")

Happiness is doing God's thing His way, a fact that can be empirically verified every day. Just try it and you'll see. That's what David means when he says, "taste and see that the Lord is good” (34:8a).

We say, "Seeing is believing." Show me proof and I'll believe it. That's how we know stuff in this world.

God puts it the other way around. "Believing is seeing" ("Taste and then you will see.") Take Jesus at His word, do the very next thing He is asking you to do and you will see. He will give you grace to do the right thing and more: He will give you Himself, the only source of goodness and with it, enduring happiness.

"Oh, the blessedness (happiness) of those who take refuge in Him!" (34:8b)

David Roper

2.13.17

Going and Not Knowing

"By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing...